Los Angeles daily herald. [microfilm reel] (Los Angeles [Calif.]) 1884-1890, 1887-12-28
Garden Roses of India.

The principal garden roses cult
waited in Europe and in India may be
traced to Western Asia and China.
The old-fashioned summer roses,
which were tho ornaments of gardens
in Europe forty to fifty years ago, ar :
mostly referred to Rosa gailico, which
has lts home in South Europe and
Western Asia, and to Rosa centifolio
and damaScena, which probably came
from the mountains OF Armenia and
Northern Persia. All these are dis
tinguished by the Incompatible deli
caCy of their aroma. and Of the
two last-named kinds one or tho
other is cultivated on u large scale in
Southern France, Italy, Macedonia,
Asia Minor, Persia and Northern III
dia, for rose water and essence Of roses
(attar). The towering seasons OF
these kinds is short, lasting a lev
weeks only, and it was an important
event for horticulture when, at the
close of the last century, the China
roses were introduced in Europe.
: The most important OF these was
Rosa indica, thus called by Linn9us
because it was brought from India,
where it had long been grown in gar
dens. Itshome, however, is not In
dia, but China, and its great value
consists i'll this, that it flowers
throughout summer and autumn,
hence the name autumnal rose,
also a monthly rose, (Nonatsrose.
For this reason variety was called
Rosa sempelfofeas. Another variety.
described under the name OF Rosa
fragroas, distinguished by its strong
though not always very delicate
scent, became the parent of the tea
roses. BY crossing these kinds and
other 81 ecies with the older garden
10 es, the numberless varieties of
hybrid perpetuals and tea roses have
been obtained which now ornament
our gardens in Europe as we'll as in
India. In India nine or ten species
of rose are indigenous, but with the
exception OF Rose Moschdta, Il mag
nificent climber OF wide distribution,
none have contributed to the pro-
.duction OF garden roses. All have
their local names in the language OF
the district where they grow, but
and this is most remarkable fact
the rose has no name in Sanskrit. In
some dictionaries lara is rendered Us
Rose, but this is altoseiher different
shrub. Hibiscus Rosd-sineRSiS, the
we'll known shoe flower used for
backing shoes) of lniian gardens, is
believed TO be indigenous in China
and possibly also Indigenous in trop-
zeal Africa. As far as known at pres
ent the roses of western Asia have no
Sanskrit name, and were not known
in ancient India. Yet Rosa dana
sceno is xten-ively grown on large
scale for the manufacture Of
rose water and the essence OF roses
throughout Northern India, as far as
Ghazipur, in p degrees north lati-
tude. Hermann Schlagintweit was,
l believe, the first to draw attention
to this remarkable fact. Il is not
impossible that the western roses
were introduced into India by the
Mohammedans. As there is no
Sansk' it word, so is there no original
term for the rose in Hindu. In most
Indian languages the cultivated rose
is called gul, which is the Persian
n ime. 1t is also called gutab, which
really means rosewater, unless, in
deed, as sometimes stated by Munshis
in India, alb in this case is a sutiix
with no separate meaning. In addi-
ton to their local names, some of the
wild roses of the Himalayas are often
called gulab ban gulab (the rose of the
forest. or wild rose. III Nature.